Ms Democracy:A Lady Without Mercy!

Welcome to all your intelligent friends who have so graciously come here along with you!

Introduction:

Democracy is a concept that almost every just-freed nation plumps for and yet most nations are absolutely in the dark about its demanding nature, that Ms Democracy expects convincing results within a time span, and that basically it’s a unanimously agreed understanding for a division of governmental power between the elected and the electorate in an 8:2 ratio, 8 being people’s share of authority and 2 being that of the elected persons.

It seems to me that the latter bunch is trying to make out most strenuously that they alone have an exclusive monopoly of governance and authority. Under that pretext they make ludicrously farfetched and wild remarks, and try to throw their weight around on the people with the inevitable consequence of losing all credibility among those that hitherto could be cajoled with toothy smiles and cheap gimmicks into voting for them!

Sometime last week, in response to the allegation that though he was an honest man by all accounts he was presiding over a dishonest ministry, the PM fumed as follows,

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“I think the public should decide whether this sort of politics should rule the roost in this country any longer!”

This made me think for a while.

I wondered what it is that could be eroding the polity’s faith in this PM who, by all reports is a somewhat well rounded—if too senile-- personality having a vision of where his nation could reach, except for having a quirky habit of keeping mum for far too long to be condoned!

What could be the hidden villainous factor?

If it’s not he, who then?

And what makes that person or group tick at a resonance jarring his?

Why must he, like that forlorn knight in Keats” poem “ La Belle Dame Sans Merci”, feel stressed and bereft of his well deserved joy of a sudden?

I soon had the brainwave that what we are observing across India today—Mao Rebellion, starvation deaths, the case of rotting grain, anarchic tendencies in society, discrimination and so on—is only a toll being imposed on our nation by Ms Democracy in a cold, probably inhuman, but logical manner for the unforgivable mistakes the previous ministries at the Centre made as well as those being made at the present moment by the UPA.

Perhaps it is sheer immaturity that is tempting them to make these mistakes but that is no excuse for being absolved from penalty!

A Lesson in Hindsight:

Let’s take an appraising look backward!

As we mined assiduously in the late 1940’s for a suitable style of governance, we passed uninterested through theocracies, dictatorships and oligarchies of various kinds, and pitched on to Democracy as most suitable for rendering justice to the inarticulate millions in our country, then numbering slightly above 400 million.

Like true devotees in front of their chosen deity the founding fathers of Free India whispered in the quiet, gathering reverent and hushed up their private needs to pray for being equipped enough to draft a Constitution based on democratic lines too. None intruded into their chorus of protracted discussions, and no firefly staged a ballet recital too.

The silent millions, living across the length and breadth of the country, waited in aspiration and longing for a Nirvana of national proportions from the abysmal misery of their daily existence.

And it shames me to think what we got in answer to our parental prayers?

A Constitution that was hastily patched up from many other existing ones and glossed over with grandiose wording—that’s what we eventually obtained from our Founding Fathers after much effort. Even that we might have endured and let go except that it was used to perpetuate the same Divide and Rule that has preceded the 15th of august 1947.

I owe you an apology here because in the first 15 to 20 years our GOI was growing absolutely well thanks to the pioneers behind our Freedom Movement. May be those gentlemen were not as professionally equipped as some of the ministers today are but they would certainly have scored 90 percentile in a 360 degree feedback process from their counterparts overseas for the sheer dedication that they displayed in unison.

It is beyond question that they possessed leadership competencies that will put to shame those that we have today in the chairs they had sat on—at least on the point of their honesty and integrity. Their all-out commitment to the Cause of India was what made for the difference!

What was their secret?

Was it that they didn’t have their quota of temptations and tradeoffs?

To understand this mystery we need to ask their souls and they reply albeit in a whisper, as follows,

”Sir, most of us belong to and hail from rather good educated families, and we know this country as very few in other countries ever get a chance to do. Our parents never felt like availing themselves of any loophole in existing laws on the score of integrity or honesty at any time to accumulate ill gotten, unearned wealth!

We have been brought up with the conviction that there must be nothing questionable about any transaction that we enter into. Our parents it was that set the bar for every one of us.

May be we are conservative to a fault when it comes to accounting principles but never liberal you may rest assured!”

We know the privations under which our men and women manage to keep their body and soul together and the indescribable hunger and thirst for some kind of emotional release that they want and pray for.

So we never felt like fattening our wallets or filling our pockets on any day we have come to work here in the Parliament.

“It’s not that we don’t have rival parties but that they are so disorganized and most of them lack a holistic vision of this great country that the Congress alone has to bear the cross of governing this nation for good or ill and taking it forward into a semblance of prosperity if not full prosperity.

Our faith differences don’t matter at all because we all pray that we be given the calibre to do justice to this onerous task.”

Let’s introspect now and ask ourselves a few searching queries:

How much impact does or can a PM or a President have on ethics and honesty in the country?

Can’t they set a ceiling for the minimum level of honesty that will be condoned within the government machinery?

Are levels of honesty really set at the top of the rungs in Indian government hierarchy?

A recent Harvard finding has it that even in organisations as huge as those that have one hundred thousand employees in different nations having different cultures, the ethics of the CEO and the top officials has a cascading effect that can be either positive or negative.

A 1% deviation from professional unexceptionableness in ethics can balloon into 10% less ethics at the next lower level and 20% less at the next rung of the echelon till the lowest percentile is reached well around the lowest rung.

The advantages of instituting a 360 degree rating:

How many of our present day State level and Cabinet ministers shall survive a 360 degree rating by the end users of the policies they have signed into law?

How many of the elected legislators and parliamentarians can hope to get a 90 percentile out of 100 in such a rating from the commoners?

Recall and Referendum being but a question of time, how many shall risk being recalled by the very same constituencies that elected them?

“Very few!” is the sole answer we can get even from our own conscience!

Elections come and elections go but as far as we know from firsthand experience elections arte but a Rubicon river that once crossed enables most persons to afford not to look back, though of course that doesn’t lead to the conclusion that on this side of the river there are but blind idiots.

An evaluation is being made all the time, 24/7 without the elected ones ever coming to –or being informed in time -know of it.

Media Awareness:

The news sleuths and lynx eyes of the media professionals are also upon them scanning their semiotics and non verbal communications in addition to what blah-blah it is that they actually come out with from time to time.

It’s superficial to think that the Indian media have zero vision and zero perspicacity.

They are well aware of the dire need to transform India’s working culture into one increasingly dependent on honesty and integrity and also that if the present day corruption is permitted to have a free ride, individual and collective integrity shall fail with increasingly nasty consequences.

It’s also an open secret among our media professionals—many of whom I happened to have taught at some time in active life—that India is in want of stronger structures to enforce professional integrity even among the elected persons, starting with real time communication and sharing of thoughts and brainwaves.

The PM’s Hamartia:

What we have invariably observed in this country is that as the people’s representatives move up from a member of the Lok Sabha to State Minister and then a Cabinet minister, they distance themselves from the axiom that their danger of being detracted for even minor peccadilloes and shenanigans multiplies.

Probably this is because many of the checks and balances they had been subjected to earlier disappear to all appearances, their subordinates seek safety in praising them unconditionally, they are conceded a longer time horizon for arriving at a decision or since they have access now to more discretionary funds.

However all these operate as a super opiate to lull them into forgetting that they are bound to deliver results to the voting public in time, in a convincing manner with adequate supporting data---even if they are obliged to lose sleep or strain over time over their work.

I wonder if the PM has taken time out to get personally convinced that unless he is alert and actively monitoring the honesty within his ministry at all times, he alone is going to be taken to task by a demanding public and afterwards, in the light of this realization, care to warn our elected persons that they are entering a dangerous territory, not just for themselves but also for their parties and the nation at large.

I guess he hasn’t bothered to do so right till now, or assumed too much ,which explains why A Raja took too much liberty with the 2G auction and Kalmadi swallowed another whopping amount from public funds using false vouches of expenditure as a conduit!

Democracy vs. Half Baked Socialism:

You may get no answer to such queries as the following today in India:

Are we a true democracy?

To what extent have we succeeded in grafting socialism onto democracy?

Are we at bottom a capitalist nation with a deceptively democratic exterior—like China with its claim of being communist but being a capitalist nation to all appearances?

Today’s India that you and I observe stretching all about us seems to be e none of these while containing elements from all these three forms of economic organization!

Nehruvian Legacy:

It was none other than the great Nehru that stated this confusion way back in the early 1950’s through his admiration for the Soviet system of centralized control(India’s FYP is modelled upon the Seven year Plan of USSR) and political intrusion into all business lines and insistence on regulatory restrictions like licence and permit at all levels. If he had been alive in 1989—when the USSR suffered a death by entropy-- he would have realized his Himalayan folly.

You may observe that Nehru it was that set in motion the trend of almost never consulting the commoners over the framework of a policy that is needed---and ironically enough targeted at benefiting the same commoners.

The warts on India’s face:

How can we go ahead unless we look into a huge mirror and see for ourselves the numerous warts on our nation’s face?

I don’t think I must recount to you how Newsweek revealed in 2009 the struggle in India for compelling the Lok Sabha members to reveal their assets and how these brought out the fact that

*128 of the 543 members faced criminal charges, including

*84 cases of murder,

*17 cases of robbery and

*28 cases of extortion and theft.

One member faces 17 murder charges too.

The NW calls our Lok Sabha “a House of Ill Repute” on this basis.

India law permits even convicted criminals to be parliamentarians till they are sentenced, say, after 25 years! This is a glaring weakness of our system.

India’s internal and external insecurity forces her hands to drain herself on defence purchases. The USD 41 billion being compulsively spent for Defence—what with its own corruption in crores, though only 1.9 % of GDP—requires part of the GDP to be diverted too.

Since we are having a Coalition Ministry with warring partners—after a long period of utterly incompetent ministries of the Aaya Ram Gaya Ram kind--, we are experiencing a political paralysis of terrible proportions all the time. This is an impediment o our economic development.

This policy paralysis is what lies at the bottom of our apparent indifference to the climate change issue, though we know that the Earth is fast nearing its environmental tipping point and Point of No Return!

>70% of infrastructure projects get delayed interminably owing to setbacks in land acquisition, basically since no reforms have been introduced in our prevailing 19th century land and property laws.

Again, global opinions about our nation and our uniquely incredible ways of keeping things undone for ever under lame excuses have been truculent.

How few things we do manage to get done, really!

By consensus the following lacunae have been getting publicity in the media trans-continentally:

· Ministers uniquely inept in HR skills ,which has made for the alienated neighbouring nations

· Indifference to the distinct likelihood for an economic collapse from the chasm between the rich and the poor, especially after austerity measures get introduced

· Indifference to the screams of “elephant to tortoise negative growth pattern in GDP “ in global media about the country

· The mental wobbling and lack of balance on our tight rope caused by confusion over democracy socialism and capitalism in Governmental approach to every issue

· Governmental susceptibility to kow-tow to capitalists and the corporate world without demur

· A trenchant policy for under taxing the wealthy, who are in fact pilfering the funds rightly due to public coffers by talking over all essential services in the nation

· A ‘death wish’ to go bankrupt through folly after folly in the wake of disinvestment and mismanagement of auctions/transactions, over privatization of public assets and services and resources

· A bias for glossing over the intense hardship and over indebtedness of the middle and working classes.

· A reform-blocking financial oligarchy

· Micawber optimism over the crippled BRICS

· Lack of motivation –as in cricket—to fulfil potential of the economy.

· Feeling snug with the 6% growth rate, which is too inadequate to maintain the economic momentum and improve living standards of our people

· Public Sector deficit of 9-10% of GDP at all times (including State governments and off balance sheet items) caused by poorly targeted subsidies like for fertilizer and food.

· Humiliating budget deficit rise from 4.6% to 5.9% as of April 2012

· Governmental debt of up to 70% of GDP which crowd out private business of any kind

· Current Account deficit of >3% GDP due to oil imports combined with slowing exports

· Weak external position resulting in INR volatility, which has brought on losses for business with unhedged foreign borrowings

· Liability to repay 45% of the 300 billion foreign currency with us today this very year

· Inadequate infrastructure in critical sectors like power transport and utilities

· Shortage of skill sets in the workforce, especially in bureaucracy ,which makes for loss of opportunities

· Deep seated endemic corruption malaise which opens the sluices to influence from external interests in policy making

Now that we have enlisted the lacunae—the warts on our faces so to say—what shall we be expect to be punished by our democracy by?

The Penalty we can logically expect:

Dear children, please don’t be shocked out of your senses as I inventory for your edification the probable outcomes of all that I have told you by way of our present-day lacunae, unless the GOI on the one hand—and every Indian on the other--sets about addressing these secret now-hidden fault lines urgently.

My handmaiden herein has been my analytic brain cells plus management orientation and temperament! May be its sheer common sense but here in this nation of many irrationalities that seems to be a rare-as-rubies commodity indeed!

I’m sorry it has fallen to yours truly to enlighten you about these nasty side effects that we can legitimately expect in the years ahead, and these are in order,

· More scams at ministerial level both in the States and at the Centre resulting in still more drain on our revenue

· Inter-caste skirmishes for superiority in status, prestige or for a monopoly of available resources

· Keener competition for housing space, higher prices of apartments with rates per square inch, incidence of illegal squatting in open plots of land, slum proliferation and an astronomical hike in land prices across the nation

· The broadening of the Naxal base on the one hand aggravated with simultaneous appearance of similar anti Establishment movements or set ups –by the poor in the lead--targeted primarily at eliminating the haves and the well propertied.

· A higher incidence of honour and inter-caste killings for “maintaining caste purity”

· Flinging out Nehruism as a helpful guideline for India’s further growth

· More stringent controls over the bureaucracy with scrutiny on their correspondence and wireless communication with corporate firms in an attempt to pre-empt capitalist influence in policy drafting

· Overhauling of the present taxing policy with probably draconian tax rates for the wealthy ,resulting in flight of capital in millions from the nation

· Total cannibalism by private players of all assets and services in the country

· Rejection of the present version of democracy for an outright capitalist one hereafter

· Protest movements by more Anna Hazare clones in varied parts of the nation on a year-round basis.

I’ve told you only of the terrible apocalypse linked to the first 15 problems that I told you about earlier. Please don’t label me a Prophet of Doom, for it’s been my sole intention to keep you informed in time of what is really predictable!

Another dozen challenges are waiting for my scanning and coolly analytic eye. We shall skip them for the time being in your best interests for the upcoming happy working day! It’s far from my intention to take on a Mark Antony role at all. You may recall his famous subtly electrifying, galvanizing and provocative lines at the funeral of Caesar!

Please ponder over every one of the quite pertinent points that we have brainstormed over and have also come to definite conclusions about. Kindly initiate wide ranging discussions among your friends and colleagues too in the most patriotic interests and in the interests of your unborn kids.

Let’s meet here tomorrow at the same time in a cheerful frame of mind then! May God bless you!